Theron did not think he would wake up again after he felt the death of the stone. It had been in his mind that he was dying with it, but something had held him firm, a link, a bond more powerful than the stone. His mate. Clare.

He opened his eyes as soon as the name crystallized and waited for a pain that never came. He sat up and looked around. He was on a couch, still in Isolation, and he was not as alone as he first thought. He looked over the back of the couch to the rest of the large room and saw his mate.

Clare?  He did not even try to hide the ferocious command in that one word.

I'm fine.

At the sound of her voice and the rush of her back into the mate link, he could breathe again. Then he remembered what had happened and looked around. Before he could voice his worry, Clare spoke up again in his thoughts, reassuring him.

She merely rests. She returned from the weave after she did something to the stone everyone is trying to figure out. She was crying. I thought she knew something about you that I did not. He could hear the worry in her words, but she skipped over it as if she did not want him to see it. She reassured me you would be fine, right before she passed out and worried her own mate. She is fine. Riva looked at you both. You, she said, were in shock. Asha depleted herself doing something in the weave, but she should be fine after a rest.

He did not need to ask about Graedon; Solan would not have let him live, but she told him anyway.

Graedon is dead.

I assumed he would be. General Fire-Eater would not have allowed him to escape again.

No, she said, then he could feel her almost fluttering in his mind her thoughts were moving so fast. I mean yes, Rendal's body with Graedon in it is dead, but so is the body Graedon left behind. We received word from Forsaken. That's what everyone is discussing. Eben and Ladon would not leave my sister and the twins just now but they sent Silver with a message. Graedon turned to dust. Literally.

Theron felt ridiculous lounging on the couch when he could feel there was nothing wrong with him and stood. That was when it hit him: he felt perfectly fine. The shock pinged through his system and the next thing he knew, Clare was beside him still in her transformed state of scaled and furred beast. The sight of her distracted him so much that again, as had happened so many times he was fast losing track, he was stunned into silence at the sight of her.

Unfortunately, what came through in his thoughts first did not endear him to his mate. Our children are going to be monsters.

The only thing that saved him was that she was in his mind and could hear that he was not exactly unhappy about that. She looked for a moment like she wanted to argue with him but really, she could hardly dispute the facts. A child of hers would be powerful and strange; add in the dragon power from his mixed heritage and they were doomed.

She wrapped her arms around his middle and rested her head on his chest. My sister had twin girls.

He knew when she felt his flinch and laughed that it was meant as retaliation. She rubbed his chest and pulled back to look up into his face.

That wasn't what shocked you so much I had to come see you were all right.

 It was not a question, but he answered it anyway. It's gone. When she just waited, he continued. The darkness, he said. Whatever my sister did to the blood stone, it freed me completely. My powers are my own again. My dragon calmed.

He felt her warmth seeping into all his shadowed places while she looked for herself. There were still shadows to find, many of them, but he was no longer in danger of being swallowed by the dark. She must have seen it herself because she relaxed against him, and he could feel a weight lifted from both their shoulders.

Then she smiled. "You can go home."

"We can go home," he answered, stressing the we with a small growl. He pulled her closer and wrapped both arms around her tightly. "Once we talk to Asha and find out what really happened in the weave, and with the blood stone, then yes, we can go home."

"After I take you by Forsaken and introduce my mate to my family."

He stilled at her words, but it was the next ones that had the blood draining from his head. "The twins are little, but they are adorable. You'll love them."

"The twins?"  The last thing he wanted to do was go into a dragon’s territory and get within a hundred stones of their two newborn daughters. That sounded like a recipe for disaster.

Something in his tone must have given him away because his mate laughed at him. "Don't tell me the big bad is afraid of two little girls."

"Two little girls whose fathers are two of the most powerful dragons in existence who are already going to dislike that I have mated their adopted sister. You want me in the same room with their newborn girls?  I would be lucky to make it out of there with my legs."

"Are they really?"  Clare asked. When he looked down at her in question she explained. "The most powerful dragons?  I mean, I know Eben is, but Ladon?"

"Prince Ladon is called prince because he is a direct line from the hereditary throne. That they are no longer a monarchy does not change the power running through his line, and he is now bonded with Eben Kinkaid and a mage of significant power in your sister. Between the three of you I have never seen the like."

"Four," Clare said absently, seeming deep in thought. "As much as it pains me Rhune will be a power in his own right."

"Yes, four. And you want to take me into the same room as them and their newborn children?"  He shook his head.

She patted his chest. "You'll be fine. You are, after all, family now."  That sent another rush of blood to his brain and feeling to his heart. Besides his sister he had never had any family, and she had been lost to him in most of the ways that truly counted. It reminded him that he had a mate, and need not fear now that any children of his would be tainted as he was by the stone. It was gone. He took in a deep breath. He needed to talk to his sister. It would not seem real to him until he knew what she had done with the stone, and if it was permanent or if he still had to worry.

These thoughts he did not share with Clare, not yet. Maybe not ever if he got the answers he wanted from his sister. For now, he would hold his mate close, and eventually join the others to find out the news from outside Isolation, then if he were extremely lucky his sister would tell him that the blood stone was gone for good. After that, he would take his mate home, rebuild Seatown, and make babies. He halted as the thought of twin girls, a mix of him and Clare, popped into his head. Or he would give the world some time to settle and return to normal before bringing his progeny into the world. It was the least he could do when he could already picture the havoc they would bring.

***

Walking up to the ornate double doors of the great ball room where the House of Earth dragons were being contained, they could hear the impatience and speculation going on behind those doors from down the hall. The dragon knights assigned the task of protecting the House dragons and containing them looked stoic and relieved when Aarion showed with the rest of them following close behind. At least they looked relieved until they got a good look at the group coming their way. They had not stopped to bathe or change and the look on Aarion’s face was enough to have their relief turning to caution. Aarion ignored them and threw open the doors to the great ball room of Isolation. The fifty or so dragons of House Earth, ranging from second molt to ancient, took one look at the blood-spattered and blood-soaked knights that followed Aarion and they all stilled utterly.

General Solan Fire-Eater was the second to enter after a brief nod to his men guarding the doors. He seemed to have taken the worst of the battle. Blood and other things coated his leathers. Cold rage sat on his face, and the mercurial silver of his eyes swirled.

The rest of them followed, looking not much better than the general, and it could not be clearer that a battle had been waged. The Earth dragons would have felt the disruption and an echo of what was happening with the magic of Isolation, but seeing the results of it brought it home that something had gone horribly wrong.

Aarion growled at them all, "Rendal is dead, and the blood stone has been destroyed at great cost." 

No one looked at Asha, but Theron felt Clare's hand squeeze his. Laksee was well and truly gone. He allowed her touch to soothe the newly lanced wound of her loss and watched as Aarion went on. Rage and intent stamped on his features, the power of his anger was pushing his magic out in a wave that belied the fact that he had nearly died that day. At that moment no one could doubt that he was the leader of the house.

"You can stay at Isolation or you can go; I don't care which. I brought you here to rebuild House of Earth into what it once was. Most of you have shown no interest in anything but talk. Fine. You are all free to leave. Return to your homes; I care not, but if you stay at Isolation know that you will be entering the dungeons and the dark places. You will see what our house has wrought—no more staying in your plush apartments and pretending it is not your job. The knights will assist anyone who stays, and anyone who stays will assist them.”

"You expect us to dig around in the dirt like common soldiers?" the belligerent, shocked voice of a prissy-looking dragon lord said from the crowd.

"I expect nothing," Aarion roared, "as that is what I have received so far from the lot of you. I am telling you that if you stay you will help clear the dark magic that lingers to poison the land your children play on. I am telling you that you will work with House of Earth to stop the spread of the dark, or you will leave.”

General Solan stepped up beside Theron and spoke, his voice hard and carrying to the corners of the room. "Before you decide understand what it is you face. The council is gone, the dragon houses splintering into factions. The old boundaries and laws that protected you and your territory are no longer standing. Eventually everyone is going to realize it and the dragons will begin to battle over land as in days of old. There are not enough dragon knights to protect all the separate territories. The boundaries of House of Earth are known to you all. Some of you have claimed land in neutral territory because under the laws we lived under you were protected. That is no longer the case. Move your family within the boundaries of House of Earth or consider yourself separated from the house and no longer under its protection."

"Are you saying the dragon knights will not protect anyone outside the house boundaries?"  the same lord asked, outraged.

"I am saying that the dragon knights will protect our own houses and go where the lady sends us as we always have. If you choose to live outside of your house, it is a bid for your own territory outside your house laws. If you live outside the laws of your house, you also live outside its protection."

Asha stepped forward before anyone else could speak, her eyes crystal and brimming with dragon seer magic. Strange winds moved around her. More than one dragon gasped when they saw her.

  "The weave is in flux."  The power behind her voice could not be denied. Everyone who heard it was touched by it and awed. Even the lords shut up and listened when the dragon seer spoke. "Dracon is reshaping itself. New blood is being introduced and the future will be built on the backs of the children. Change is inevitable, and some will seek to profit from the chaos before it can be shaped. Some encroachers will be dragon. Some..." a pause, "…other. Only those who seek shelter from the coming storm will survive it, though none will be untouched by it. The children must be protected before all else."

"There are no children here," a woman called from the crowd, the sadness in her voice clear in the room.

The dragon seer turned and caught the woman in her seer eyes and the lady paled, shrinking back from the power in those eyes. "There will be."

Asha's words hit the room like a hammer to steel, and it was not just the woman who felt the power of them.

The promise of children, Theron thought, watching the dragons’ reactions, changed everything.

It should, his mate caught his thoughts and responded. Even immortal dragons will eventually die out without children.

Yet this house had killed his father because he mated a dragon female and exiled him to the humans because he was not full dragon.

New blood being introduced, she mused. Change meant to save Dracon, and they would not accept the change.

 He watched his half-blood sister sway and her mage mate catch her—saw, too, more than one Lord of House Earth look disgusted by the pairing.

Even now some will not accept it, Theron said, looking at the faces before him. This was the very house that had allowed his sister to be caged and tortured and his father and eventually his mother killed. He could see on most faces that they welcomed the change if it brought them children. Others would never accept the changes that were taking place for that to happen. Mage and dragon pairings. Children of mixed blood and power. They would not see it as anything but the death of their way of life.

"A coming storm," Clare murmured. She turned to face her mate, putting her back to the room full of dragons. "They will need help."

He saw the searching look in her eyes and brushed a finger down her cheek. "Then the mage of Seatown will be ready."  He leaned down and kissed his mate, for the first time without the fear of losing control and hurting her sometime in the future. It was liberating, and he never wanted to stop touching her. "Let's go home," he growled.

Clare sighed. "Yes," then she ruined it by laying her head against his chest and finishing, "after we see my family."

Theron growled again, this time for an entirely different reason.

***

Forsaken Mountain had been home of Eben Kinkaid for as long as memory. As the oldest dragon still living, he was also known far and wide as the dragon executioner. A bit over seven feet and built for strength, he was all ripcord muscles and fluid speed.

He wore a loose tunic and trousers tucked into black boots. A medallion hung from his neck with the crest of his house engraved in the ancient gold, nearly an identical color to his eyes. His hair was black but with the iridescent sheen his scales would carry in his other form. He also radiated old power, and was feeling decidedly territorial amidst the splendor that was his home.

Today the boogeyman of dragon-kind held a baby cuddled in his arms while he tried not to get caught glaring death at their visitor.

Stop it, Morgan said, laughing in his head from across the room where she stood with her younger sisters. Next to the red of theirs her hair looked even more brown, but he knew it would shine with amber and gold highlights when the light hit it. He did not need to see the sparkle in her grass-green eyes to know she was laughing at him. He is family now.

He did not even try to smother the snort of disbelief at her words. Lord Theron of Seatown was a half mage, half dragon upstart raised among the humans. The only thing Eben knew for sure about him was that he was Clare’s mate and he had worn a blood stone.

You can see as well as I can that he is of the light, his mate said with exasperation, just as her second mate returned to the room after having taken their other daughter to be changed.

Ladon was the typical golden bronze of House of Fire, shiny and beautiful where Eben was dark, and slightly shorter than Eben at just under seven feet, with wide shoulders and slim hips. His shimmering bronze hair was as incandescent as his scales were in his dragon form. The first thing he did when he entered the room was glare at Theron and come to stand with Eben. Both men faced down the upstart lord with a baby cradled in their arms.

Behave, his mate said with exasperation, this time to both of them. Ladon looked toward the green-eyed sisters and smiled, blowing his mate a kiss and promising nothing.

He still has all his limbs, Ladon said with a bit of humor accompanied by satisfaction at just the thought of what he wanted to do to Theron. We are behaving.

Eben could feel his mate’s humor bubbling around them. You could stop glaring at him and actually speak to the man.

Eben felt his lip curl up at the idea.

Why? Ladon thought back to her, clearly seeing no reason to make the man feel welcome.

Eben had to agree. He did not want the man to feel welcome. He wanted the dragon mage to leave. Quickly.

Morgan huffed in his mind, Because we will never see Clare if you scare off her mate.

Glancing up, he caught Clare’s glare flashing their way from where she stood talking to her sisters, and cleared his face of hostility. Though truth be told, he thought, staring at the man his wife’s youngest sister had mated, he did not look like he could be scared away. If anything, he looked resigned to put up with them.

Ladon clearly agreed with him because he snorted in disbelief. This one is not so easy to scare.

Eben watched a look pass over the man’s face before he looked over at his mate, and all the ice that had coated his eyes melted away as he smiled at her in reassurance. Clare smiled back at him and shook her head. Then Theron turned back to them, the look in his eyes a touch heated, before catching their eyes on him. He wiped all expression away again. But they had caught it. The look spoke of a depth of feeling they would not have thought the hard man before them was capable of. And all of it was for Clare.

He knew Ladon had seen it too when he sighed, then his humor returned and coated his next question. He isn’t going to give you a reason to kill him, is he?

No, Eben answered, disgruntled.

His mate laughed at them both, touching them even from across the wide room. He could put up with the dragon mage if it meant so much to his mate.

When he had to.

***

Theron caught a slight softening in the two predators that stood before him, and it was not the babies in their arms. While Forsaken had a warmer, more welcoming feel to it than Isolation had, despite the opulence of his surroundings, Theron had no doubt that was due to the Lady Morgan and her sisters, rather than the dragons whose territory he now trespassed in. The babies held by the dangerously powerful dragons he faced might have fooled some, but he was a dragon despite being half mage, and raised among the humans. Having their daughters in their arms made them more dangerous rather than less. He would take the slight relaxing of their territorial anger as a good sign, but he was not fool enough to think he was out of danger. He forced himself to relax anyway, not wanting them to think they intimidated him. They did, but he was Lord Theron of Seatown; he would be damned if he appeared weak to what amounted to his new relations.

Clare must have felt his slight relaxing because he felt a trail of warmth down his back as her mind touched his. Then she assured him once again.  Told you they wouldn’t kill you.

They would if I gave them the slightest excuse.

She laughed. Is that why you are standing like a wall, saying nothing to each other?

Yes.

She laughed again. Before she could say anything else Rhune ran into the room. “What did I miss?”

He had stayed behind at Isolation with Solan to help with healing, so Theron assumed he would soon have General Solan Fire-Eater joining them.

Wonderful.

Rhune looked around expectantly and then at the lack of blood and fighting he looked disgruntled. “Furee said you would probably need a healer by the time Solan got me home.”  He sounded so disappointed Theron almost laughed.

General Solan followed the boy into the room and without more than a look around the room headed for his mate. Melisande smiled up at the general, her eyes going soft at his appearance. The smallest sister, she shared Clare’s red hair and green eyes but with a shorter and rounder figure than his mate. She was also a wind mage, as powerful as himself if he was not mistaken, which meant that despite her air of soft fragility that became glaringly obvious when she stood with her much taller and harder mate, she was not fragile or weak.

“I believe Furee was making a joke at our expense, hatchling,” Eben said, his eyes on the young mage, humor softening the old golden blaze of his power. Those eyes moved to meet Theron’s. “We do not battle with family.”

Theron raised a haughty brow at the declaration and then Clare was beside him, her arms circling his waist while she laughed in his head. I told you it would be fine.

“Unless, of course,” Kinkaid added, almost as an afterthought, “they give us cause.”

Theron was no fool and knew it for the warning it was. He turned to look at his mate. Can we go home now?

She laughed in his face. Soon.

At that look directed at him, Theron finally relaxed. He could put up with her family of terrifyingly dangerous dragons and mage as long as she looked at him like that. Soon he would have his mate to himself in his own territory. He could give her time with her family if it made her happy. He would even agree to come back…for short visits.

Spaced well apart.

 

***

This is the end of the Dragon Mage Series but the beginning of the The Dragon Knights.

Look for Aarion’s story, coming in 2019.

 

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